I hope that vigorous space exploration continues and that humankind will have a space station that resides between Earth and the moon. Outside the gravitational field of Earth, we could launch robotic spacecraft to other destinations in our solar system.

Debra Fischer

Categorized in : Hope Earth Moon Space

The building blocks of life are readily available throughout the universe.

Debra Fischer

available building universe life

Within the scientific community, there is healthy skepticism. And the question is, 'How do you ever get to a meaningful null result? How long and how hard do SETI scientists have to look for extraterrestrial intelligence and find nothing before they say, 'There is nothing. We are alone.'

Debra Fischer

alone you intelligence community

It now seems logical that all the stars, like our own sun, must have formed with a system of planets around them.

Debra Fischer

own like stars sun

Generally speaking, exoplanets can be any size, and they are found in a wide range of orbits. Some have massive gas atmospheres; others are smaller with an icy or rocky composition.

Debra Fischer

others some size found

One of the first thoughts I had, when doing early exoplanet research, was that Earth and its many companions seemed very different from the planetary systems we were detecting.

Debra Fischer

thoughts doing research earth

In 1999, my team discovered that the star Upsilon Andromedae was circled by three gas-giant planets - the first distant multiplanet system ever found. That same year, other researchers observed the first 'transit' of an exoplanet - a planet blocking out a small fraction of the starlight as it passes in front of the star.

Debra Fischer

small year three team

The first exoplanet to be found around a sun-like star was discovered in 1995, just two years before I began studying exoplanet detection.

Debra Fischer

studying first just two

Further ahead, I'd like to see tiny spacebots - smaller than your cell phone - travel outside our solar system to the nearest star system, Alpha Centauri. By keeping the mass of those spacebots low, we could more easily accelerate them.

Debra Fischer

phone your cell-phone travel

Prebiotic chemistry on other worlds is going to be common. Plenty of small rocky planets will have similar chemistry. It's almost a given.

Debra Fischer

going will small chemistry

If few worlds have microbial life, it dramatically reduces the chances that more complex organisms exist.

Debra Fischer

complex exist more life

Science requires speculation, creativity, and wild ideas.

Debra Fischer

wild creativity science ideas

The universe has told us the most common types of planets are small planets, and our study shows these are exactly the ones that are most likely to be orbiting Alpha Centauri A and B.

Debra Fischer

us small universe study

Because Alpha Centauri is so close, it is our first stop outside our solar system. There's almost certain to be small, rocky planets around Alpha Centauri A and B.

Debra Fischer

alpha outside stop small

Before 1995, the only planets we knew about were the planets in our solar system.

Debra Fischer

solar about only solar-system

Ultimately, what we're looking for in the long run is to find other Earth-like planets.

Debra Fischer

find looking run long

The gas-giant planets in our solar system all have large moons.

Debra Fischer

solar system solar-system planets

When stars form a planet, they come in a bunch.

Debra Fischer

planet come form stars

We now know that stars which are abundant in heavy metals are five times more likely to harbor orbiting planets than are stars deficient in metals.

Debra Fischer

more now know stars

Whether a star has planetary companions or not is a condition of its birth. Those with a larger initial allotment of metals have an advantage over those without.

Debra Fischer

without over star birth

Computers can't find the unexpected, but people can when they eyeball the data.

Debra Fischer

find computers unexpected people